ANIME in the USA Part 1: Tapes from the Underground
What started with a small core of avid viewers equipped with the first home VCRs continues now on the web through the work of fan-subbers. A brief look at the birth and evolution of anime fandom in the United States.
This was originally created for the Independent Film Channel to promote the broadcast debut of the [...]
ANIME in the USA Part 2: Eisenstein-Sensei
On the one hand, you have the Russian director; on the other, you have Japanese animators who, out of necessity and by either accident or design, find themselves resorting to his theories to create a unique genre of film. A brief look into how a cinematic pioneer helped form what’s come to be known as [...]
Fant-Asia: 2008 San Diego Asian Film Festival - It’s Baaaack
At last year’s San Diego Asian Film Festival (SDAFF) audiences squeaked and freaked at the outrageously warped horror/sci-fi film fortune cookie features that were uniquely Asian with movies like I’M A CYBORG BUT THAT’S OKAY; THE VICTIM; and ANG PANAMA. These far-out films were deliciously wrapped around a whole afternoon with George Takei and his [...]
DVD Review: Forbidden Kingdom - Jackie and Jet Meet Expectation
By Dr. Craig D. Reid
Over the years, I have interviewed several screenwriters of American made martial arts films, and each has boasted how they are working on a screenplay for Jackie Chan and Jet Li, where the top two, living and still fighting on celluloid, martial arts screen legends of all time, were totally up [...]
Sukiyaki Western Django
by Dan Persons
Takashi Miike goes all KILL BILL memory-dump on the spaghetti western with SUKIYAKI WESTERN DJANGO. It’s like when THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN paid homage to Kurosawa paying homage to the western in THE SEVEN SAMURAI, but way crazier.
Movie Review: “Ashes of Time Redux”
by Dan Persons
Hey!
Bet you’re looking for the review of ASHES OF TIME REDUX. Don’t fret — just click on this link, and you’ll be taken there instantly (if not sooner)!
Thanks, and have a scientastic day!
Film Review: Late Bloomer
by Dan Persons
Hey, Oprah, empower this!
You’ll be forgiven for getting that uncomfortable feeling during the first half of LATE BLOOMER. The lead, Masakiyo Sumida, is disabled — he employs a motorized wheelchair to get around (although he apparently can walk for limited distances), uses a digital speech machine to communicate, and seemingly is forced to [...]
Cybersurfing: “Aria the Animation” Trailer Goes Online
by Dan Persons
Come to scenic, Mars-based Neo-Venezia, where beautiful, female gondoliers paddle… gondolas and… look beautiful. That’s essentially the gist of the trailer you’ll find here, promoting Rightstuf’s upcoming release of ARIA THE ANIMATION (click the tabs at the left to start the video). Sure looks pretty, in any case.
Kung Fu Panda vs. Forbidden Kingdom
KUNG FU PANDA is a not-so-little animated film from DreamWorks that is actually kinda “mystical and kung fu-ey.” It could have been a one-joke picture (as I feared from the early trailers), or another film filled with modern, hip jokes & references (like SHREK or A SHARK’S TALE – entertaining though they may have been). [...]
Film Review: House of Flying Daggers (2004)
Director Yimou Zhang’s follow-up to HERO (2002) is another high-class, artsy interpretation of the martial arts genre. Like its predecessor (and like CROUCHING TIGER, HIDDEN DRAGON), HOUSE OF FLYING DAGGERS takes ideas and elements seen in dozens of Hong Kong, Cantonese-language movies and synthesizes them into an elegant, beautiful piece of film-making. The studied, artistic [...]